


Ending Up

by somethingnerdythiswaycomes



Series: Twelve Fics of Christmas [8]
Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Kaiju, Brotherly Love, Chuck has Emotions, Diners, Everyone Is Alive, Father-Son Relationship, Holidays, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Yancy Is A Good Brother
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-29
Updated: 2013-12-29
Packaged: 2018-01-06 13:50:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1107613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somethingnerdythiswaycomes/pseuds/somethingnerdythiswaycomes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yancy never managed to get Christmas off of work, and it was always the one day that the diner was empty at 2 AM.  Until the kid walks in at 2:07 and refuses to buckle under Yancy's charm.  He could never resist a challenge, and a college kid that won't even tell him his name is the best one he's ever met.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ending Up

**Author's Note:**

> Fic #8 of Twelve Fics of Christmas--based on 'Yancy/Chuck, diner at 2 AM'

The diner was usually decently busy at 2 AM.  Through fall all the high schools were doing their plays, and then the college kids came home and still thought the coolest thing they could do was hang out in a diner in the middle of the night.  Yancy didn’t mind; if he couldn’t be sleeping or spending time with his brother, he’d rather be busy during his shift.

Christmas was always different.  No one came in at 2 AM on Christmas.  Yancy always wound up with this shift despite requesting the day off, and he always spent it leaning on the counter and watching the time tick by.

Until that kid walked in at 2:07.  The kid that asked for a table for one in an Australian accent, and Yancy sat at a table close to the counter.  The kid seemed personally offended by the Santa hat Yancy was wearing; if he hated Christmas, it would explain why he was here at this time.

“I’m Yancy,” he said, falling back on the innate charm that got him good tips, even from cheap high school kids.  “I’ll be your waiter tonight.  You want something to drink?”

“Water,” the kid replied curtly, handing the menu to Yancy.  “And I’ll have a burger and fries.”

“You sure you don’t want to look through the menu?” Yancy asked, writing down the order anyway.  “We have great waffles, or if you’re going with the whole meat thing, there’s a really good pot roast.”

The kid stared at him for a moment, then repeated, “Burger and fries.”

Yancy shrugged and tucked the menu under his arm, flashing him an easy grin.  “All right, whatever floats your boat.  And I didn’t catch your name.”

He looked up at Yancy and raised an eyebrow.  “That’s ‘cause I didn’t tell you.”

Yancy stared at him expectantly.  The kid stared back.

“First initial?” Yancy asked, grinning.  The kid rolled his eyes.

“C.”

Yancy nodded, backing towards the kitchen doors.  “Right, I’ll go put in your order.  I’ll figure out your name.”

The kid snorted and rested his chin on his hand.  “Don’t bother.  You aren’t going to fucking get it.”

“Hey, this is a family establishment,” Yancy reprimanded, but he couldn’t keep a straight face.  The kid tried to scowl, but couldn’t quite manage it.  And then Yancy was in the kitchen.

 

.oOo.

 

Yancy had put C by the counter on purpose.  The manager didn’t really care if the waiters and waitresses stayed by the counter when they were working, so this way, Yancy could lean against it and talk with C without getting in trouble.

So once the order was in, with the normal estimated time of ‘whenever its fucking ready,’ he went out to bring C his water and then retreated to the counter.

“So what brings an Australian around here?” Yancy asked, flipping his pen between his fingers.

C sipped his water and flicked his eyes over to him.  “Holidays,” he said, after a moment of hesitation.

Yancy raised an eyebrow.  “You travelled here for the holidays, but you’re in a diner on Christmas?”

“You’re working on Christmas.”

Yancy shrugged.  “I requested the day off ages ago.  They didn’t give it to me.  They never do.”

C shook his head and drank some more water.  “Fucking ridiculous.  You should request next year’s off tomorrow or something, so they can’t say someone asked for it earlier.”

Yancy tossed his head back with a laugh; when he looked back at C, he was smiling, and Yancy could see a hint of dimples.  When Yancy finally gets him to really smile, it’s going to be adorable.  “They’d still find some excuse.  Paperwork not going through or something.”

C shrugged.  “Probably.”

Yancy grabbed the water pitcher and topped up C’s glass.  “Hey, what’s your name again?”

“Nice try,” he replied with a snort.  “You’re not going to get me that easily.”

“First letter of your last name?”

C studied him for a moment.  “H.”

Yancy chuckled and put the pitcher back, using the time to figure out what else to talk to him about.  He didn’t want the kid to close himself off, like he had been when he came in.  He was fun to talk to, and it certainly beat standing around in silence and staring at the clock.

“So do you live around here?” Yancy asked, settling back against the counter.  He hadn’t heard the bell from the kitchen yet, and that would be the signal to grab C. H.’s food.

“I couldn’t have travelled to this diner?  Planned this trip out and everything?”

Yancy laughed and flicked his tongue over his lower lip.  C. H. followed it with his eyes.  “Everyone knows you don’t plan out a 2 A.M diner trip, especially to this place.  You end up there.”

C. H. conceded the point with a tilt of the head.  “I’m visiting my dad,” he responded, drinking some more water.  “He had to move here for work while I was at uni for the semester, and now I have to stay with him for the holidays.”

“I’m sensing some tension.”

“You could say that,” C.H. said, dragging his finger through the condensation on the table.  He didn’t look up at Yancy; Yancy hadn’t really expected him to.  “We don’t really get along.  We can’t talk to each other.  I’m not good at talking to anyone, really.”

“What do you call this?” Yancy asked, waving a hand between them.  C. H. glanced up then, his lips pursed.  “That wasn’t rhetorical, you know.”

“He’s always asking me questions,” C. H. said finally, reluctantly.  “I don’t like answering them, so we fight.”

Yancy chuckled.  “That sounds like me and Rals, my brother.  We fight over the stupidest things.  Make up easy enough, though.”

C. H. shook his head.  “We don’t make up.  We’ve had the same fights going on since I was 14.”

Yancy bit the inside of his cheek.  Sounded a bit too much like he and his dad had been, and that had been a dangerous situation before he’d been able to get Raleigh and Jazmin out of there.  “Start small.  Little communications.  Small talk.  Chatting at dinner.”

“He just remarried.”

“Ah.”

“To a man.”

“…Must be a change.”

The bell dinged, and Yancy sighed.  “I’m gonna go grab your burger.  Second letter of your first name?”

With a small smile, C. H. looked over at him and said, “H.”

Yancy grinned and went into the kitchen to get Ch. H.’s burger.

 

.oOo.

 

He waited until Ch. H. had started to eat before bringing up his dad again.  “So, if you guys don’t get along, why are you staying with him for the holidays?”

Ch. H. put his burger down and looked up at him.  “He’s my Dad.  We always spend the holidays together.  Don’t you and your brother have holiday traditions?”

Yancy sighed and tugged his Santa hat off so he could brush his hair back from his eyes.  “We try, but between our work schedules, it’s rough.  I get off at 3, he starts at 7.  He’s done at 7, and by then we’re too tired for any big meal, so he picks up some Chinese and we eat that.  I get off work and get a little time to relax, then I make breakfast for when he wakes up and we eat and trade presents, he goes off to work and I sleep.  That’s Christmas for the last 4 years.”

Ch. H. frowned.  “Four years?”

“Yeah,” Yancy replied, putting the Santa hat back on and starting to twirl the pen again.  “We haven’t been able to have a Christmas dinner for four years.”

Ch. H. chomped down on a fry.  “That must be hard.  We do the whole big ham dinner, but its…weird.  I feel like you and your brother have a lot more fun and are a lot closer, even without all the traditional food.  We have the meal, but it’s like we’re strangers eating at the same table.”

Yancy crossed his arms.  “Have you tried telling your dad that?”

Ch. H. snorted.  “He wouldn’t listen to me.”

Yancy grinned.  “I bet you ten bucks he would.”

Ch. H. rolled his eyes and held up his water glass.  “Fill this up, would you?  That _is_ what you’re getting paid for.”

Yancy laughed out loud, bringing the water pitcher over to the table and filling his glass.  “I’m expecting a good tip, C-H-…”

“U,” Chu. H. said, taking a sip of his water.  “Besides, if I wanted to collect when I win that bet, that means I’d have to see you again.”

“Such a hardship, I know,” Yancy replied, putting the pitcher back behind the counter.  “I work almost every night here.  I’ll give you my number.”

When he looked back at Chu. H., his cheeks were bright red and he was stuffing fries in his mouth.  Yancy grinned and leaned back against the counter, purposefully stretching his body out the way he did when he went out to bars once in a blue moon.  Chu. H. blushed harder and looked away.

“How about if I give you my number, you give me yours?” Yancy asked, pushing his shoulders down a little, to stretch his shirt over his chest.  When Chu. H.’s eyes drifted down to stare at his chest, Yancy counted the move as a success.

Then he nodded, and Yancy grinned wider.  They traded numbers, and Yancy went back to standing normally.  He didn’t want Chu. H. to choke on all those fries he’d been shoving in his mouth.

“My dad wants me to transfer to a school near here,” Chu. H. said after a moment.  “So that we’ll be closer together, instead of 21 hours of flying.  We fought about it.  That’s why I’m in a diner at 1 A.M.”

“I was supposed to go to the Naval Academy,” Yancy replied.  “Then Mom died and Dad started hitting Rals and Jazmin.  He didn’t go after me because he knew I could fight back.  I didn’t go and started working instead.  Once I had enough money, I got them out of there.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Chu. H. asked quietly.

Yancy glanced at the camera in the corner, then decided the manager wouldn’t say anything to him about this.  He went over to Chu. H.’s table and put a hand on his shoulder.  “I chose my brother and sister over my education.  It wasn’t always easy, and I’m still not always sure it was the right decision, but I don’t regret it.  You have to choose between staying in Australia or being closer to your dad.  I figured I’d share a similar story.”

“My name’s Chuck,” he said, as an answer.  Yancy smiled and squeezed his shoulder, then let go.

“Nice to meet you, Chuck.”

Chuck smiled back, then picked up his burger again.  Yancy moved back to the counter.

They didn’t talk again until Chuck finished eating.  Yancy knew that Chuck needed to think; when he was trying to decide what to do about Navy, it had taken him weeks of locking Jazmin and Rals in his room to sleep while he stayed awake and turned over the different sides of what could happen five, ten, twenty years down the line.

Then Chuck’s plate was clean.  Yancy picked it up and grinned at him.  “You want anything else?  Chocolate cake?  Coffee so you don’t fall asleep on the drive home?”

Chuck shrugged.  “No thanks.  Didn’t drive here.”

Yancy pursed his lips.  “You didn’t take the N4, did you?”

Chuck frowned.  “How did you know that?”

That stops running around 2, you must’ve caught the last one out here.”

Chuck bit his lip and looked down at the table top.  “Oh.  I… guess I better call my dad to pick me up.”

Yancy really didn’t think that was a good idea.  “If you wait for 10 minutes I can give you a ride.”

Chuck looked over at him.  “Really?  Thanks,” he replied, smiling brilliantly.  There were those dimples Yancy had wanted to see, and they did not disappoint.

Yancy took the plate and turned back to the kitchen.

“You know,” Chuck called to him, making Yancy stop and turn.  “My dad always makes too much food for dinner, more than enough for four people.  If you wanted to, you and your brother could probably come over for dinner.”

Yancy grinned back.  “Well, then I’ll have to have you over for Christmas breakfast.”

“I don’t want to cut in on your time together…”

“You won’t be cutting in,” Yancy replied.  “And besides, we could get up to a little something-something before I have to cook.”  He winked, just to make sure Chuck wouldn’t misunderstand.  Going by the dark red blush on his cheeks, he didn’t.  Yancy chuckled to himself, giving Chuck a brief respite as he dropped the plate off in the kitchen and brought the check back out.

The blush was gone by then, which was a shame, but Chuck was looking nervous.

“Look,” Yancy said softly, putting the check down on the table.  “I can give you a ride home, no hard feelings, or you can come over for breakfast _without_ feeling like you have to sleep with me.”

Chuck frowned at him.  “I know that.”

Yancy smiled.  “Just checking.”  He leaned over and risked a quick kiss, making Chuck flush red again.

Chuck rolled his eyes.  “Don’t you have work to do or something?”

“7 minutes,” he said with a grin, then went to fill up the water pitcher.

“Besides,” Chuck said, leaning forward on the table and following him with his eyes.  When Yancy glanced back, he caught Chuck staring at his ass.  “Sleeping with you wouldn’t exactly be a hardship.”

“Right back at you,” Yancy said, ducking behind the counter.

“I feel like this was all planned, somehow,” Chuck mused.  “The bus stopped running, you don’t get your requested day off, my dad had to move here…”

“Sometimes, Chuckles,” Yancy replied, popping up over the counter just to catch the look on Chuck’s face, which was a fantastic scowl, “Things just end up a certain way.  So far, I like the way this is all ending up.”

**Author's Note:**

> i'm sorry this is more family emotions than romantic emotions.
> 
> currently unbeta'd. when i have the beta'd version i'll replace it.


End file.
